My parents are snowbirds (when the snow flies, so do they) so they often read this column after it has run. They've recently returned to their Brookfield nest, and my mom wasted no time influencing this month's recommendations. After finishing Susan Elia MacNeal's "His Majesty's Hope" (Bantam, $15), the third in an engrossing WWII series, my mom said, "You need to recommend this and the author needs to write faster."

Maggie Hope, the series hero, has dreamed of becoming a spy ever since she was a "typist to Prime Minister Winston Churchill" and then a "maths tutor to the Princess Elizabeth" at Windsor. As the Nazis tighten their grip across Europe, Maggie gets her chance. Thanks to her secret training (including lessons from a "Glaswegian safecracker"), her keen intelligence with codes, and her "big stones" (as the Brits say), Maggie is recruited to an elite group of spies to infiltrate the offices of the Nazi hierarchy. | May 17, 2013»Read Full Article